// ENG // This story is about the recent situation in Puerto Rico, and about the one-week visit I have just made to the Island.

So you know, I have been committed to exploring the environmental, social, and economic contradictions of radicalized climate change for the past twenty years. I am currently doing a PhD in Sweden in art, technology, and design. I am questioning how ‘greenhouse’ – as concept, gas, effect, technology, and possible ‘social pedestal’ – shapes and displays the concealed forces of colonial memory. One other thing. I am Puerto Rican.

So … the nuclear explosion that I describe in the title is not just about the two hurricanes that swept Puerto Rico in September. I also refer to the broader, slow, and invisible radiation that entire countries are now enduring: the waves of deliberate contradictions emitted by the collision between free market speculation and global warming. It was my teachers and now longtime friends, urban ecologist Jean Gardner and her partner, artist Paul Ryan, that taught me early on that these contradictions create, not bifurcations, but very complicated ruptures in the relationships that give coherence to our societies. I refer, yes, to its maximum expression, President Donald Trump, but also to the petro-geopolitical wars, and the abusive and disproportionate exploitation of land and sea. In the past, these contradictions were limited to small areas or the weakening of corporations as a speculative technique. But since the 90’s, the market has turned to target whole countries, particularly their natural resources and/or their economic vulnerabilities. This speculative technique is combined with the pressures of global warming, developing, if capitalising upon an incongruous idea of ​​’sustainability’, thus in turn radicalizing the acceleration of climate change itself. For me, these macro-tendencies represent worrisome forces that are of the same scale as global warming, and therefore exceed our visual horizons and immediate experience. That invisibility, not unlike how Timothy Morton has recently expressed, is deliberately mediated and geographically fragmented into various nuclei, which is for me (as I am sure for many others) the ‘nuclear explosion’ of neo-colonialism. Since what I propose surpasses the scale of our common senses, I focus on the specific case of its most recent crystallization, Puerto Rico.

Even if impossible, I try to be impartial about the past and current situation in Puerto Rico. I also suppose that if you are Puerto Rican, there is a 50% chance that you will be upset with me. But that is the point, the problem of the present binary, irrational and counterintuitive contradiction we are now living. That is why I tell you that Puerto Rico was a colony of Spain since the ‘discovery’ in 1492 until 1898. Its native Taino societies were enslaved and annihilated by the Spanish, not to mention made Puerto Rico one of many African slave trade ports. The US seizes Puerto Rico through the treaty of Paris, in the exchange of Latin American post-war ‘properties’. Puerto Ricans are immediately absorbed, many as military soldiers, and strategic air, land, and naval bases are installed around the island. Many Puerto Ricans have died in all the wars in the United States, from the First World War to the present day. For example, of all those Puerto Rican soldiers recruited, more than 61,000 go to the Korean War and more than 48,000 to the Vietnam War. In the Korean War, 577 soldiers from the state of Florida (pop. 4,951,560 in 1960) die in combat… 764 from Puerto Rico (pop. 2,355,569 in 1960). We have American ‘citizenship’ since 1917, we can travel without interruption to the US, but we do not have democratic representation in the congress, and we do not have an electoral vote (No, we did not vote for President Trump, and Puerto Rico would have been a deciding factor if it was a state). The independence movements are violently and systematically eradicated by the US, especially in the 50’s and 60’s when Puerto Rico had to, and I mean it had to, contrast the Soviet presence in Cuba. On the other hand, and much more subtly, the pro-statehood movement (for Puerto Rico to be a state of US) which is understandibly resisted by many in the island, is unquestionably also sabotaged by the US government. Every time Puerto Rico moves forward in any direction out of the colonial malaise, unexpectedly, but not-surprisingly, forces come out from nowhere to derail us. The philosopher Jaques Derrida described the violence of ‘forgetting’ as inherent to the very concept of the archive. He calls ‘anarchive’ the condition of ‘superrepression’, of a sort of selective amnesia that the concept of ‘archive’ presupposes. Traditional colonialism – and now complimented by that gross and creepy neocolonial strain I mention above – is real and continues to be recorded, if violently suppressed onto the collective psyche of Puerto Rico, causing deeply repressed, divisive invisibilities replete with contradiction, all leading to a paralysis of democratic and environmental justice.

// ENG //We now move to present context. For me, the detonation occurs in 2006, when the government of Puerto Rico shuts down. The closing occurs as a perfect storm, where the toxic and putrescent political discourse in Puerto Rico, between those who want to continue being a colony and those who want to be in the US state, reaches a fever-pitch of ideological crisis. Mainly it is a moment where the government runs out of funds, and therefore fails to solve the problem, to surpass it and sustain the island economically in local, regional and global contexts. The explosion begins, the disaster unfolds so slowly that it is not perceived, like looking at the sun to see its passage. The country inevitably falls more and more into an external debt that is clearly subject to the indifference of the betting casino that is the global market. We become an easy target of speculation. We join the Iceland / Greece crew. But in our case, we can only beg the US for help. We can not ask any one else. There is no long-term vision, because there is no time, only policies of putting out fires. Then, global crisis of 2008 arrives, and the descent is now a tailspin.

In 2015, Puerto Rico, through its ultra-incompetent Governor Alejandro García Padilla, declares a virtual national bankruptcy and a state of economic emergency. And, largely because of his incompetence, President Obama imposes a ‘board’ of experts, a board, none of them democratically elected, like something out of the eighteenth century, to ‘administer’ the Island. The external debt is 72 billion US $ (yes with ‘B’). To give you perspective, that means that every Puerto Rican (who lives on the island), with an average income of 19,000 $ US pa basically owes 240,000.00 $ US per person (aside from their own personal debt), compared to the average debt distribution per capita in the US of ca.45,000 $ US per person, or of 28,000 $ US of Germany. And that per capita number in Puerto Rico is rising fast, because of the crisis, and now the hurricanes, to hemorrhagic emigration had begun, not only of the people in general, but of young people, doctors, artists, engineers, etc. The social and physical infrastructure is completely destabilized, and we are all to blame, one way or the other.

//

Crossing Aibonito. // Crossing the island through the town of Aibonito.

// ENG // On September 6, the Category 5 hurricane called ‘Irma’ was set to pass by the north coast of Puerto Rico. The strength of Irma has no precedent in its intensity. It hits and causes unspeakable destruction in many Minor Antilles, Dominica and St. Marteen are flattened, among many others. For us, several municipalities are hit very hard. Irma destroys the island-municipality of Culebra, one of our priceless touristic and environmental patrimonies. And Irma causes major damages, particularly to the electricity grid in the northeast of the main Island. Already, the government is over-extended to address these damages.

A week later, another storm is identified leaving the hurricane formation area of ​​the Cape Verde Islands in the eastern Atlantic. They call her ‘ Maria’. For Puerto Rico, a mostly Christian island, after so many storms and hurricanes through the centuries named with banal and inconsequential names assigned by the order of a predetermined list, the name ‘Mary’ immediately causes concern and premonition. The forecasts are alarming. And, in the early morning of September 20, Maria was just south of the southeast coast set to diagonally cross northeast across the island, from coast to coast. Maria also made landfall as a Category 5. Sustained winds of 275km / hr. with gusts that were far stronger. In the end, the phenomenon of two hurricanes of these magnitudes, arriving one behind the other in such proximity, has no historical precedent whatsoever. None. Those who did not believe in the impact of global warming in and out of Puerto Rico, I most sincerely hope they are now reconsidering, especially small business owners and the insurance industry, surely must be now convinced. It is stated that the situation in Puerto Rico is the largest ‘natural’ disaster in the history of the United States. Greater than Katrina.

I propose that the twin-sister hurricanes Irma and Maria are obvious manifestations of this strain of neo-colonial global warming. They are an index and obvious manifestation of an abused Mother Nature reclaiming her path from an ungrateful and abusive man, now causing a ‘super-decompression’ of that colonial memory that has been suppressed unto the human psyche. That, as a ‘colonial anarchive’, Puerto Rico now expands as a ghost of the future of the ‘free’ market; a specter that is incomprehensibly exploited as a ‘greenhouse’ to experimentally capitalize on the nightmare of the difficult economic and social future of radicalized climate change. But in the madness, will there be a very small opportunity that could have immense productive consequences … if we reorient the ghost and see through its eyes, as Esther Peeren would suggest, will it become a truly sustainable model?

On November 8, the Governor of Puerto Rico Ricardo Rosselló Nevares, an accomplished scientist and geneticist, declares that same spirit for the recovery and reconstruction of the Island, one which is an opportunity to ‘reinvent’ a new type of sustainability, of energy and economy But the reality is extremely complicated. The estimate is 100 Billion $ US that will be needed to rescue the Island from the catastrophe. Can Puerto Rico eat together, put aside the self-destructive political impasse and embrace this delicate yet crucial opportunity without resorting to greed, truly seeing the long-term horizon for our future survival, one we will all enjoy?

// ENG // Since the 100Billion $ US figure was announced, Puerto Rico has failed into oblivion … the selective amnesia of ‘an inconvenient truth’. The international press keeps on fanning the radioactive stench of President Donald Trump. The governor of Puerto Rico is left with the impossible task of negotiating with this man out of public scrutiny. The impasse is a scale model of the onslaught itself. Of course, hurricanes are truly force majeure, but it is not like your family member falling ill … we have skin in this mess. We are part of it. And this will affect you, no matter where you are. Because the ripple effects, social and financial, of these crises, will reach everyone, especially when we are witnessing these crystallized nodes popping up in more and more remote, but treasured locations. Going to Mars may be a great plan for a few billionaires, but what will happen to you and me? We still have time to get our ship rehauled and chart another course, it is less about technology and more about a change in our attitudes … just spend a little less energy, you might just be a little more hot, or a little more cold, drying your clothes by wind instead of tumbler, please believe me, it can be a lot easier than it seems. But you have to give a damn. And so, I leave you with some thoughts from my diary while at my beloved home-Island. Please do not give up!

// ENG // Day 0 I have decided to come to Puerto Rico for a week, to see and support my parents, sister, brother in law, and family. I also take the opportunity to investigate aspects of the tragedy that are of personal interest to me in my doctoral research process. I sincerely thank Professors Leif Dahlberg and Håkan Nilsson, of the Royal Institute of Technology and the Konstfack University of the Arts, respectively, who are my supervisors at my base-institutions, for their support in making this visit possible.

// ENG // Day 1 One of the pleasures of my life is the approach overflight by the edge of the north coast of Puerto Rico as I am about to come home. It is the beauty of the coast in contrast with the Cordillera Central mountain range in the distance; the anticipation of seeing my family; and to feel the sea waters of Yemayá. On this occasion, what I felt was another anxiety. The landing would be in broad daylight. I knew I would see the traumatic disaster from the air … I would see the scale … and although I tried to prepare myself, my worst worries began to be realized, seeing the devastation caused by the hurricanes Irma and Maria that hit on the 6th and 20th of September, one after the other. I see the island virtually shattered. Everything.

// ENG // Day 2 We live in Isla Verde, near the airport. So, when I get home, I always have a ritual … I talk to my parents and my sister for a while, and no more than an hour later I go to the beach at least a few minutes to feel the sand and the sea. This time, my family forbids me. My mother tells me – “The beach is bad because of the emergency and everything that came down the mountain in the rivers … I heard that we waited a few more weeks.”

// ENG // Day 3Today I got into the car, real early, to start seeing things up close. First problem, there are no traffic lights. It’s just crazy. You have to drive almost paranoid. But I drove, no other way to move now. I went first to El Yunque, our adored tropical rain forest. Mother Nature reasserts herself. I know it. She gives us a lesson in humility for her capacity to destroy, and even more so for her ability to recover … but this time, I do not know, two hurricanes, so strong, just not normal. I wonder if this is a maginitude that exceeds the time-scale of evolution. Just can recover quickly enough. We loose diversity. I had been in two other hurricanes, years apart from each other. It feels totally different, too many fallen old trees, so much devastation, it will take decades to recover the vegetation and delicate fauna that El Yunque fed. And everyone I talk to is having difficulty in projecting how long will it take for the people. The damage is deep and systemic. Just horrible.

// ENG // Day 4Yesterday I crossed the Island to visit my family in the south, in Ponce. When one goes from north to south along the panoramic road one witnesses to traversal cut of the island. All devastated, the forests burned by wind, all exposed, the camouflage of green beauty of the Puerto Rican flora has disappeared. People walk on the edge of the road as if lost, empty faces, still greeting you trying to be nice, but it is anguish what comes out, not knowing that there will be tomorrow. Once in Ponce, I saw only one of my two great-aunts (her name is Irma) who is well. I also see my 44-year-old cousin who takes care of my aunt with my brother-in-law and my nephew. The rest of the family left for the United States. I do not know what to say. My cousin, who has always been stoic, is in a state of nerves, so many problems at the same time, and she must go to work, because if she does not go, you are fired. Many have already been, at the worst moment. Small and medium businesses can not survive. No electricity means no income, they can not make payroll … Yes, luckily, there is some aid, but it is very very limited … the chain of problems … this is the real nuclear explosion, the radiation ripple hitting hard in slow motion.

Professor Luis Santiago in the Urban Garden of the UPR. // Professor Luis Santiago at the ‘Urban Orchard’ of UPR.

// ENG // Day 5
Today I went to the Botanical Garden of the University of Puerto Rico and I am received with warm kindness by Prof. Dr. Melvin Carrión who has the most difficult task, among many others, to restore the Botanical Garden complex. It was destroyed almost completely. There are three tragedies … before the hurricanes, almost everything had been abandoned, the economic crisis had already begun the devastation. And then … the hurricanes, one behind the other. The state of the Botanical Garden is an emblem of the problems on the Island. But, two wonderful reasons fill me with hope … first I am introduced to a true teacher, Professor Luis Santiago, with his students and his garden collaborators. They, with what we could call charitably ‘limited resources’, have given life again to the Botanical Garden, immediately, in just one month. They have done it through the ‘urban orchard’. One of the most beautiful things I’ve seen in my life. I started to share and listen to the unimaginable difficulties they had before and after the hurricane (not as a complaint, simply answering my questions). He offers to show me the rest of the disaster. I (re)encounter another of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen in my life — the collection sculptures in the Garden, all surviving in parallel with the devastation! I swear it has been a profound moment. To be with the art as a ‘nature’ … usually in these sculptural gardens, the flora complements the art … on this occasion art was trying to return the favor … a precious tragedy.

// ENG // Day 6It’s 23:15. I just came back from dinner with a childhood friend. We talk about everything that has happened. While we were eating, a strong rain fell. Very strong. There were floods literally in front of us. In fact, I realise right there and then that while I have been in Puerto Rico it has rained every day. That is, post-hurricane, and with these rains, the drains are overloaded, and everything has flooded again. I almost could not get back home. Cars stopped everywhere, probably without being able to call to receive help, because by the heavy rain the cell lines fell again. I stopped because I saw a car in very bad conditions. I asked if you need help. The lady says to me – “Oh, do not worry, my son is walking home to find the other car. We live here close by in Santurce. Thank you.” My heart is torn.

// ENG // Day 7 I wake up, and head out to meet the Secretary of Agriculture of Puerto Rico at his office. I am in the car, but the traffic is so slow I can write these sentences. I do it because something hits me … again, there are no traffic lights. But I notice, despite some madness and some who want to get 13 seconds sooner, wherever, that the vast majority of people are totally self-organizing, being much less impulsive … could we continue without traffic lights?

// ENG // Day 8 I met with Agronomer Carlos Flores, Secretary of Agriculture of Puerto Rico. It has been an important day. I have learned so much from him about the situation in Puerto Rico, not just how horrible the situation is on a daily basis for so many families that work the land and the sea. But, still more so about the challenges for agriculture in general, before hurricanes, and now after. The challenges get exponentially worse. There are 200 million $ USD of crop and animal losses are catastrophic in the short term for farmers, ranchers, and fishermen. Long-term? There have been 1.8 Billion $ US of destruction to the infrastructure, and that is only in agriculture From the specific point of view of Puerto Rico, there are no words to describe what those numbers means to the future of the island. Yes, we can look at it as a possible call to unite, work, and rebuild the island … but we can not forget those who suffer the day to day struggle of this horrible nightmare.

//ENG// Day 9
It’s my last night, the electricity has failed again a few hours ago, and apparently will not return until tomorrow. Here then writing this hypomnemata with fist and pen by candlelight. I hear the loud rumbling of the emergency power plants burning diesel without mercy. I think about the amount of toxic gases going into the air, about the garbage and rubbish from the mountains and from the street that have drained into the sea. I think of the millions without electricity tonight, many without water which is even worst. And I can tell you, by my own experience in the past few days, that I cannot foresee how these basic needs will be restored back. I would be shocked if it happens in less that six months. It is really bad, and the consequences are still just now beginning to ripple. I question what we are fundamentally doing to the Earth, that the catastrophe only amplifies, and even uncovers, the toxic patterns that are camouflaged by our ways of living. But, I also think about the way I have seen people helping each other, I see volunteers, public workers, local and foreign, working tirelessly. I remember that there is traffic, but I see people negotiating it as never before, a self-organisation that I did not expect, that the metabolism of society adapts if it is really needed. Can we not forget that this is an opportunity to make those changes to the way we live? Will we remember not to continue to sit around to depend on disasters and crises to change?